Telephone voice mail systems are well known. Some voice mail systems include a call screening feature which, after the extension is designated by the caller, asks the caller "Who is calling?," records any response by the caller, and plays the recording to the called party so the called party can decide what action(s) to take thereof. The called party then presses a key to take the call or presses another key to instruct the voice mail system to play a recording like "Mr. Jones is not available, please leave a message . . . ," possibly followed by a further prompt to the calling parties proving them with more options.
Some voice mail systems include an auto forward feature. This feature is enabled by the extension owner, before leaving the extension. In the event a call is received, the auto forward feature instructs the voice mail system to ring another extension that has been specified by the extension owner or to dial back out and connect the caller to the dialed line outside of the called party's telephone system. In some voice mail systems, the extension owner may record a message to be played to callers before the call is forwarded.
Some voice mail systems include a call blocking feature which allows the extension owner to instruct the voice mail system to play a message to the caller, stating that the called party is not available, or to connect the caller to a voice mail system to leave a message. Some voice mail systems include a call holding feature which operates if the designated extension is busy. This feature gives the caller the option to be placed on hold and subsequently put through to the called party if the extension becomes available.
Voice mail systems in the prior art give the user/extension owner several options for handling incoming calls. However, they do not provide the user with the capability of compiling a set of information for the most-frequently called or calling parties and handling each incoming call individually according to the compiled information for a particular party.
Therefore, there is a need for a system and method having an address book that the user/subscriber can store information individually for each party in the address book. The information can then be used by the voice mail system to automatically handle calls to or from each party.
There is also a need to provide a system and method having an address book for handling the messages stored in the voice mail system for the subscriber and treating each message individually according to the information stored in the address book for the calling party. It is desirable to provide a user interface to maintain and manage the information in the address book.